


The Ferris Wheel Job

by squireofgeekdom



Series: The Lost Light Job [2]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Leverage Fusion, Fluff and Humor, M/M, Trans Character, Trans Male Character, Trans!Rodimus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-20
Updated: 2018-11-20
Packaged: 2019-08-26 09:51:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16679344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/squireofgeekdom/pseuds/squireofgeekdom
Summary: For a fluff prompt on tumblr: driftrod being terrible children who refuse to focus on a missionIn which Drift and Rodimus are shmoopy and ridiculous, their teammates are exasperated, shopping the food trucks does not count as doing a proper search, and no, neither does winning silly carnival prizes for your boyfriend, and things end up back on mission entirely by accident.





	The Ferris Wheel Job

**Author's Note:**

  * For [choomchoom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/choomchoom/gifts).



Rodimus is laughing in his ear, his breath against Drift’s neck.

 

In his other ear, Drift can hear the rest of the team sighing over comms. 

 

“If we could please focus.” 

 

“Uh huh.  _ Totally _ focused,” Rodimus chokes out over huffs of laughter, still tucked up against Drift on their seat. Drift tugs Rodimus in closer so he can rest his chin on Rodimus’s head, and looks out over the side of their ferris wheel cabin. The sun’s getting closer to the horizon, the light rippling out over the ocean as the sky starts to dim to shades of pink and gold. 

 

With the hand he has around Rodimus, Drift runs his fingers through Rodimus’s hair absentmindedly; it’s getting long. It makes Drift happy, not only because he likes how soft it is, tangled in his fingers, but because he knows how long it’s taken for Rodimus to be comfortable wearing his hair even just longer than a close crop, after how long it had taken for him to cut it short in the first place, to call himself Rodimus. 

 

Drift smiles.

 

Then he lets the soft smile slip into a grin, turning his head slightly to look the other way, down at the pier. “How are the  _ dance hall  _ and the  _ long beachside walk  _ going?” 

 

There’s spluttering over comms that’s probably Magnus, who Drift supposes has to get the benefit of the doubt for being new, so he won’t tease him for it. Probably. Not much, at least. 

 

“No sign of the package here,” Nautica says, her breathing a little fast - is she actually dancing?

 

“You can’t blame us for taking the dance hall,” Skids teases, “it’s the one place that says ‘no shirt, no shoes, no service’, and we know  _ you _ .” 

 

“Hey,” Rodimus says, “I paid eight thousand dollars to not have to wear shirts, it’s  _ earned _ .”

 

“Oh,  _ you  _ paid?” 

 

“Listen,” Rodimus laughs, “the money may have come out of that bastard’s super pac, but I still had to actually pay it, it counts.” 

 

Rodimus is wearing not one but two shirts as he leans up more tightly against Drift, tucking his left side behind him - the side where Drift knows the scar is. Not the surgery scars, the other scar, the knot lower down on his ribs. Drift’s sure Rodimus isn’t aware he’s doing it, but he squeezes Rodimus’s shoulder anyway. 

 

Rodimus may be comfortable enough wandering around their place in nothing but yoga pants he stole from Drift when it’s just the four of them, but the odds of him going shirtless when Megatron was on the ground with them - even for a  _ beach heist -  _ were effectively nonexistent.

 

Speaking of, “Where are you two? You’re supposed to be combing the rest of the pier.” 

 

“We are! We’ve got the best view in the house,” Rodimus says, as their cabin comes to the top of the wheel, but he’s looking at Drift. 

 

“ _ Please  _ tell me you’re not on the Ferris wheel.” Megatron says, as Skids starts laughing. “How on  _ earth _ do you expect to see the package from there?”

 

“Oh no,” Rodimus makes staticky noises, “your signal’s breaking up… oh no…. kschhhhhh…. must have…. kchhhhhhh….”

 

“Rodimus.” Megatron says, “We both know that’s not how Nautica’s comms work.”

 

“ _ Obviously. _ ” Nautica mutters. 

 

“You never know, you could have gotten too far out of range on your  _ long beach walk  _ with  _ Magnus. _ ”

 

Megatron coughs. “We are still searching for a possible drop point, but unless the drop point is in your cabin -”

 

“We can see  _ people.  _ We’re looking for suspicious  _ activity _ , Megs,” Rodimus says, and Drift tries not to laugh. 

 

“Please,” Megatron sighs, “do an _actual_ _search,_ ”

 

“What, you haven’t found the drop point behind a suspicious seashell?” Drift asks; Megatron doesn’t deign to respond. 

 

“Well, you can’t expect us to get off  _ now _ , we just got to the top,” Rodimus says.

 

Skids snorts. “ _ Cowards. _ ”

 

Drift can  _ easily _ picture Skids tying off one of his rigs to one of the Ferris wheels struts and somehow managing to make a jump all the way to the bottom of the wheel. 

 

“I think that would be the opposite of ‘low profile’,” Nautica says, obviously thinking along the same lines.

 

Not being high-flying thieves, they get off the Ferris wheel once they reach the bottom.

 

“So, ‘proper search’,” Rodimus says with an easy grin, “where do you want to look?”

 

“Hmmm,” Drift considers, grinning back before looking around the pier, his stomach grumbling, “ _ well,  _ I think those food stands  _ probably  _ get enough traffic that no one would pay attention to someone making a drop around there.”

 

“ _ Certainly  _ makes sense to me,” Rodimus says. Megatron groans over comms.

 

Drift buys a cone of soft serve about the size of his head, and an armful of churros for Rodimus, but of course, when they walk down the pier, Rodimus ends up feeding him pieces of several of the churros, and he offers Rodimus stolen licks of the cone of soft serve. When they get to the end of the pier, with nothing obstructing their view of the water, the sun’s just crossing over the horizon, and the firey colors painted across the sky are mirrored in the ocean. When Drift kisses Rodimus his mouth is still covered in cinnamon and sugar, and Drift can’t keep himself from licking the last of the soft serve from the corner of Rodimus’s lips, Rodimus letting out a breathy giggle.

 

There’s a long, exasperated sigh from the comm line, the kind that Megatron somehow manages to make intimidating.

 

“Canoodling stays  _ off comms,”  _ Nautica says, clearly trying not to laugh,  _ “ _ guys, we  _ agreed _ .” 

 

“‘ _ Canoodling’ _ ? Really?” Rodimus says, laughing so hard that his head falls down against Drift’s collarbone. “Why did you let Ratchet introduce them to Roller?”

 

“If you two are interested in focusing on the mission anytime soon -”

 

Rodimus just laughs at that. 

 

“Oh, we’ll call you if we find anything,” Drift says, running his hand through Rodimus’s hair and pushing it back from over his ear so he can gently take out the earbud, before taking his own out, tucking them both in his pocket.

 

Rodimus looks up at him, having recovered from his laughter. “I’ll have you know that I was saving that for later,” he teases. 

 

Drift looks at him and very deliberately licks the cinnamon and sugar off of his lips. 

 

Rodimus’s skin is dark enough that it’s hard to see a flush, especially in the low light, but with their faces this close Drift can practically feel the heat from the blood rushing to his face. 

 

Drift kisses him again; no interruptions.

 

Rodimus doesn’t let him go after, tucking himself against Drift’s shoulder. “It’s  _ chilly.”  _ He says, warm breath against Drift’s neck, “I thought California was supposed to be hot all the time.”

 

Drift just smiles and takes the excuse to tuck Rodimus in close against him, Drift’s arm around his shoulders and Rodimus’s arm around his waist. Rodimus always runs warm, and curled up around him Drift doesn’t feel any of the chill coming in off the water.

 

“What do you think?” Rodimus says, “I don’t know that we’ve thoroughly ‘searched’ the games down this way,”

 

“Mmmm, sounds fair,” Drift says, and they wander in between the rows of stalls, all offering increasingly ridiculous prizes, giant teddy bears, slightly misshapen plush aliens, foam hats -

 

Drift laughs at the sight of a stuffed animal nearly half his height. Someone had decided to make the plush cat with a dark brown and black lion’s mane, now in a bit of disarray, almost exactly like Rodimus’s hair. But the rest of the manufacturing team clearly hadn’t gotten the memo, because the rest of the cat is covered in tiger stripes.

 

“Looks like you,” Drift teases. 

 

“A tiger with better hair?” Rodimus laughs, leans in to Drift until he’s breathing against his neck, “ _ Rawr,”  _ he mouths against Drift’s throat, lightly scraping his teeth across his skin, and Drift laughs even as he feels the tips of his ears go hot. It has to be unfair,  _ somehow _ , for someone to be so ridiculous and so hot at the same time. He runs his fingers through Rodimus’s hair, tangling them in it to tug him back up into a kiss. 

 

“Gonna win it for you,” Rodimus says as soon as Drift breaks the kiss, his breath warm on Drift’s lips. “Just watch.” 

 

And of course, Drift follows him up to the booth - some sort of sharpshooter game - and Rodimus puts down money for tickets. 

 

He pouts when he only hits one of the targets on the first try. 

 

“C’mon, you know this is just a money trap,” Drift murmurs into his ear, “these things are rigged, let’s just go,”

 

Rodimus immediately looks back up, eyes bright, “C’mon, Drift, I only failed  _ once _ , you know I don’t give up  _ nearly  _ that easily.” He says with an easy grin, fire in his eyes even has he rummages in his pockets for extra quarters.

 

“I love you,” Drift says, and kisses him, adding. “For luck.”

 

The extra change he hands Rodimus helps too. 

 

Drift walks away with the giant tiger-lion hybrid under one arm, a triumphant Rodimus under the other. 

 

“Told you I’d win it for you,” Rodimus says, smug, and Drift runs his fingers through the ends of his hair. It’s softer than the lion’s mane, that’s for sure. Rodimus tucks his arm around Drift’s waist. “Love you too.”

Drift smiles.

The sky’s started to get dark now, the lights on the ferris wheel and roller coaster are shining bright across the pier. 

 

“Want to ride the roller coaster before we go?” Drift asks.

 

“You never know,” Rodimus teases, “roller coaster car, could be a drop point.”

 

“Have I ever mentioned that I like the way you think?”

 

“You have,” Rodimus says with a grin, “but I like hearing it.”

 

They finegle their way - well, mostly Rodimus does - to be first in line. Rodimus’s excuse is that it will let them walk past  _ all  _ of the roller coaster cars and check each one, Drift certainly isn’t going to argue. 

 

Unsurprisingly, they don’t see the package in any of the roller coaster cars. 

 

Drift does  _ feel  _ the package when he nearly steps on it getting in to the first car. 

 

He looks down and there it is, unmistakable, exactly matching the description.

 

“Rodimus,” He hisses. 

 

Rodimus looks. Rodimus curses under his breath. 

 

“Okay. Okay. Low profile,” He says, and nudges Drift to get in the car, shifting the package out of view after he sits down. “We need to -”

 

There’s a very conspicuous man in a suit making his way through the line, and Drift suddenly remembers that their comms are in their pockets. He tenses immediately - he’s on the wrong side, he needs to be able to put himself between Rodimus and -

 

Rodimus puts a hand on his shoulder, whispers in his ear, “Let me take this one,” he says, before dramatically draping himself over Drift, and the stuffed cat he still has in his lap. 

 

“Excuse me -” the man says, and Drift is reassured by the fact that he’s clearly unarmed, and his jitters say ‘businessman out of his depth’ - exactly what they expected - not ‘trained professional’. “excuse me, I need to be in that seat, I -”

 

Rodimus giggles, lets his voice go up half an octave, “What? But we just sat down, right honey?” he says, giggling again and pressing a sloppy kiss to Drift’s cheek.

 

Rodimus never calls him ‘honey’, it’s their cue that Rodimus has to grift. 

 

As far as grifts go, though, Drift’s pretty fond of this one. He slings an arm around Rodimus, pulling him even closer, practically into his lap. “Sorry,” he says with a laugh, “no room,”

 

“I think I left something there on the previous -” he protests, to the harried attendant who has finally caught up with him. 

 

“Sir, we need everyone to sit down now,”

 

The attendant pulls him away from their car and Drift breathes a little easier for a moment. Rodimus leans into Drift’s shoulder, sneaking a glimpse behind them.

 

“He’s still trying to get on.” Rodimus whispers.

 

“Seriously? Why not wait from the ground?” Drift murmurs back, leaning over Rodimus, lips almost touching his ear. “Does he think we’re going to jump out with it?”

 

“Skids would.”

 

Rodimus mutters a curse. “Second row back.”

 

“Sir? Sir, we need you to sit in  _ your  _ seat, for your safety, we need to put the guards down,” 

 

Rodimus pouts, and leans over to kiss Drift again, arms around him, hand sneaking back to grab the comms from Drift’s pocket, before sitting back in his seat and letting the attendant put the guard down around each of them. 

 

As they start to move, Drift reaches over to squeeze Rodimus’s hand, taking the comm that Rodimus has palmed for him and putting it in his ear on the pretense of adjusting his bun. Rodimus pushes hair out of his eyes and puts his in. 

 

As they take the first dive, Drift relies on the distraction of the rest of the train to mutter. “We have the package.”

 

“So you’ve finally decided to - what?” Megatron says, “You what?”

 

“We have the package.”

 

“Where are you?”

 

“On the roller coaster.”

 

“Is this a - “

 

“Not a joke. The drop point was the first car of the roller coaster.”

 

“Where -”

 

They take a big drop and Rodimus whoops.

 

There’s a moment of silence.

 

“You’re actually riding it, aren’t you?” Megatron sighs.

 

“We’re leaving the dance hall now,” Nautica says.

 

“We’ve got a tail. Two rows back. Unarmed. ”

 

Megatron mutters darkly on the other end of the line.

 

Rodimus laughs. “Not much we can do about it now.” He says, tugging Drift to lean over just far enough to kiss him, just as they go over the hill of the last big drop, and Drift’s stomach flips up, and his heart beats faster with more than adrenaline.

 

Danger’s right behind them, and Drift feels  _ giddy.  _

 

The coaster begins to wind to a close, and as it slowly draws into the station, Rodimus surreptitiously nudges the package open, separating the contents from the case. 

 

“Rodimus -”

 

Rodimus leans over and whispers into his ear. “Last one to the Ferris Wheel has to do laundry for the week.”

 

And then, as soon as the guards come up, he grabs the case, holding it in plain view, and runs before Drift can stop him. 

 

It’s insane. 

 

Drift grabs the contents of the package, tucking them between him and the stuffed cat to hide them, and starts running. 

 

“What’s happening? Do we need to converge on the ferris wheel?”

 

“I have the package, Rodimus is running distraction. Someone - Nautica, get to -”

 

Nautica’s already clearly been running towards the roller coaster, Skids right behind her. Drift hands her the stuffed cat.

 

“What -?” she starts, and then realizes Drift has handed over the contents with it. 

 

“Gotta catch Rodimus before the tail -”

 

“Go!”

 

“Megatron, get to the ferris wheel, the buyer’s following Rodimus there -”

 

“What the hell is he -”

 

“I’m pretty sure he’s getting on it.” Drift says. “Nautica has the package, get the buyer, you’ll have -”

 

He’s almost at the ferris wheel - it’s gotten dark enough that there’s basically no line - and he can see the man in the suit running towards it from the other side, clearly struggling. Rodimus is laughing as he hops towards the nearest cabin, the one about to pull away from the ground.

 

Drift leaps over a guardrail, ignoring a shouting attendant, and runs after Rodimus into the cabin, skidding into the seat so fast that he runs into Rodimus, kisses him without a breath to spare, kisses with all the adrenaline running through him. 

 

Rodimus has his hands knotted in Drift’s shirt and is breathing hard when Drift leans back, just slightly, to see the man in the suit, still on the ground, arguing with the attendant - but they’re now far off the ground, too high to reach.

 

“Pretty good, huh?”

 

“I don’t know,” Drift says, “I think you just wanted to ride the ferris wheel again,”

 

“With you,” Rodimus says, “that was the crucial element of the plan, you see,”

 

“Hmm,” Drift says, seeing Megatron making his way through the crowd, Magnus behind him, to confront the buyer. 

 

They’ve got the dramatics handled.

 

“Well, you’ve got me,” Drift says, and takes Rodimus’s comm out of his ear. “What’s the next step of the plan?”

 

Rodimus looks down, watching the lights of the pier slowly get smaller as the wheel turns slowly. “We’ve got time.”

 

Drift kisses him at the top of the ferris wheel.


End file.
